Pokémon cards are becoming multibillion dollar market. Crypto wants to fix how they trade
Collectors are spending millions on trading cards, while blockchain startups are turning physical Pokémon cards into digital assets. The harder task is creating enough liquidity to compete with established marketplaces.
Make preferred on
Share this article
Summary
- A booming Pokémon trading card market, now estimated at roughly $10 billion to $15 billion, has driven long lines at retailers like Costco and record-breaking sales, including Logan Paul’s $16.5 million Pikachu Illustrator card.
- Big-box chains such as Target and Walmart, along with eBay’s $2.62 billion in 2025 card sales, highlight how trading cards have evolved into a major alternative asset class that has recently outperformed the S&P 500 and bitcoin.
- Startups like ATH Labs’ Deadstock are betting that tokenizing high-grade cards on blockchains and storing them in vaults can modernize this fragmented, slow-to-trade market, though they still face stiff liquidity and network-effect advantages from incumbents like eBay.
